Budbreak

Budbreak

For JW and WW

I.

March 22, and life pivots
Mother Sun climbs the rungs
Of her annual ladder
Solstice to Equinox.
In the Georgia woods,
A lone wren calls.

Ground fog rises
Through trunks painted
In grays, and corrugated
Browns. The aged
Palettes of Bruegel, Elder
And Younger

But small greens call
Spring’s name. That
Boisterous child of
Each solar cycle.
Trees leafing out
Fast as snapped fingers.

Mint, moss, and shamrock.
Limbs putting on
Lime cloaks, ripening
To olive, like my
Skin, aged from
Ivory to speckled tan.

II

Leaf-fall is months away,
And that final Winter.
Three score and ten, yet
Not for all. Wyatt, 21,
Who dove again, and again,
Into a chemical sea.

Arms extended, we
Reached through
Funneled currents, and
Wrestled the ten-armed
Reaper but the…